Morgan Spurlock got to know the men of One Direction pretty well while he was directing their documentary “This Is Us,” and he told HuffPost Live on Tuesday that he always knew ex-member Zayn Malik struggled with fame.
Malik, who Spurlock called “probably my favorite guy in the band” and “probably the best singer in the group,” announced last week that he was leaving One Direction to return to being “a normal 22-year-old who is able to relax and have some private time out of the spotlight.”
Spurlock told HuffPost Live’s Ricky Camilleri that he saw that sentiment in Malik from the time they met:
He always struggled with being on the road. He’s a homebody. He wanted nothing more than to sit in his house and spray paint and draw and do art, and I think this explosion that happened to him — which was something none of them ever predicted — but I think he was the one who struggled with it the most. And being away, being on the road, being away from his girlfriend I think finally just got to him, and I think he said, “I’m done.”
Unbeknownst to Spurlock, a Malik solo track called “I Won’t Mind” was uploaded online less than a week after his departure was announced, leading to speculation that Malik actually left the band to pursue his own career.
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